Always Teatime
by Random-Battlecry
Summary: They're at tea. They're always, always at tea, and there's no time to wash the things between whiles. A series of short pieces, featuring the genial beverage and based around an overloaded table.
1. The Hatter Regrets

**A/N: Because writing Alice in Wonderland stories seems to be my default setting, I decided a multi-chaptered story was the way to go, as opposed to continually posting new ones. The chapters may even end up having something to do with each other! Wouldn't that be, as they say, a turnip for the books? (Okay. They don't really say that. But it _sounds_ like that's what they're saying.)**

**

* * *

**** The Hatter Regrets**

They were at tea.

"It's not funny," said the Hatter.

Regardless, the Hare and the Dormouse carried on tittering.

"It's _not_."

"It _is_, though," gasped the Hare, pointing a paw at the spectacle. The Hatter turned to look at it again, and turned the edges of his mouth down in disapproval. Perhaps it wasn't _entirely_ her fault, and perhaps his disapproval wasn't _entirely_ directed at the girl; there was certainly enough of it to go round.

"I hardly suppose _she_ finds it so amusing."

"How do you know?" chirped the Dormouse. "Why don't you ask her?"

The Hatter regarded Alice impassively; she was still stumbling about, unable to get the teapot off her head. Mulish little noises were emerging from the spout as well as a repetitious, bubbly, "_Glub glub glub_." The teapot had been full when her head had been placed in it. But, he reasoned, most of the liquid had escaped down her neck, and she could _probably_ breathe through the spout quite adequately.

"I doubt she could answer," he said. "And if she did, I couldn't understand her."

"Well, _there's_ nothing new, then," said the Hare snappishly.

"Mm, suppose so," said the Hatter, somewhat distantly. He folded his arms, reaching up briefly to tug at his hat brim. "You know what's tragic, however?" he demanded.

"_I_ do," said the Dormouse. The Hare whapped him one with the back of his paw.

"A little respect," he hissed. The Hatter remained oblivious, enraptured by the fact that Alice appeared to have stunned herself on a nearby low-hanging tree branch.

"It is a _terrible _waste of tea," he said, regretfully.


	2. Old Hat

**Old Hat**

They were at tea. A fight had commenced, largely centred around the fact that the Hare had commandeered one of the Hatter's toppers and cut two large holes for his ears.

"You said you did not _own_ them," the Hare was saying. "You said they weren't, strictly speaking, yours. You _said_ that you only _sold_ them."

"Oh, _hang _what I said!" said the Hatter, in mourning over the mangled article of haberdashery. "I was speaking with the King at the time. One can hardly expect one to speak truth with kings, can one?"

"One might," Alice put in, "expect one to be supremely truthful when having audience with the King. After all, one reserves respect for one's ruler, does one not?"

They ignored her. She sighed, and returned to wringing out her hair. They really were the most inconsiderate of creatures, she thought; always fighting amongst themselves and not listening to the voice of reason: Alice herself, of course. But what could one do, in such a situation? It reminded her chiefly of her mother's frequent complaint, which boiled down to one word: _Men! _And, Alice amended, _Hare! _It didn't sound quite as potent— _Men! Hare!_— but adaptability was a virtue in any modern girl. Perhaps the Latin— _Leporidae! _Well, if nothing else it had the _feeling_ of authority; and illusion was _very_ important.

"At any rate," said the Hare, snatching the topper back from its maker and perching it once more on his head, "it does fit lovely, don't it? Er— doesn't it?" He preened.

"Who taught you to speak?" snapped the Hatter, gnashing his teeth slightly in his furor.

"Er— my mother," said the Hare, drooping his ears over the top of the hat till they dangled like a fringe in front of his eyes. This had the effect of making him look rather sheepish. "But she was a very bad teacher, you see; and I was a terrible pupil. Which, as you might imagine, did not help matters."

"I imagine no such thing," said the Hatter, drawing himself up straight in his high-backed chair. "I would not waste my time."

"Oh, it wouldn't be wasted," assured the Hare. "And Time is not yours to waste. So there."

"Hmmph," said the Hatter.

"Mm?" questioned the Hare.

"Eh," said the Hatter.

They were quiet for a moment, and Alice decided that this meant it was her turn to attempt to inject a little sanity into the conversation. She'd been waiting for this for a very long time. She cleared her throat, set down her tea cup, straightened her dress.

"Please—" she began, but the Hatter turned to her and said, crisply,

"You shouldn't talk with your mouth open."

It took poor Alice a full five minutes to work up the courage to voice her rejoinder, which was, "Excuse _me_, Mr. Hatter, but if I don't speak with my mouth open, no one could hear me."

"E_xact_ly," said the Hatter, with no small amount of triumph.


	3. Pepper

**Pepper**

They were at tea, and things were as normal— at least, as normal as could be managed, considering the circumstances. Perhaps not too very normal at all, Alice amended. Things were as usual, then, until, quite suddenly, they weren't.

The Duchess appeared, hurrying along as though chased by wolves, her full skirts clutched in both hands. She leapt the low gate leading to the garden and descended on the party at the tea table, panting and bedraggled as a wet goosefeather. With some indignation, she marched up to the Hatter and demanded, "What's taken you so long?"

"Mm?" said the Hatter distantly. Alice had recently turned up her nose at a remark he'd passed, and he was pondering the difference between this and something else— "Do you suppose anyone shall ever learn to turn down their nose, the way one turns down a bed or a marriage proposal?"

"I can_not_ imagine," said the Duchess. "I say, I _can_not. But that is beside the point. What on earth has taken you so long to get here?"

The Hatter subsided gently back into his daydream, leaving Alice to venture, "But _we've_ been here all along, Duchess. It's only that you've just arrived."

"Nonsense, child," said the Duchess with a wave of her hand.

Alice, who had been to school and thus knew nonsense when she heard it, was quite sure it wasn't. "But you've only just got here," she objected. "And you've been hurrying so, why, you're _still _out of breath! We've just been sitting still, you see."

"Aha, you _feel _as though you've been sitting still," said the Duchess triumphantly. "But the earth turns, does it not?"

"I suppose," said Alice, cautiously. "Very slowly."

"And so all the while you were coming to me. _Very_, as you say, slowly."

"But you ran all the way here," Alice pointed out with, she thought, considerable logic.

"I ran _in place_," said the Duchess, again with the air of having scored a major victory. To this Alice only sighed, and sipped her tea.

"Oh, look," said the Hare, ears drooping miserably, "here comes the Cook."

And here the Cook did come indeed, sailing airily through space. She landed in the garden, standing on a chair and muddying it with her footprints. She brushed herself down briskly.

"And how did _you _manage to come here?" asked Alice, too amazed by this to be polite.

"Simple," said the Cook. "I jumped."

"And allowed for the turn of the earth, I suppose," said Alice, then went on, "Oh, but that's nonsense. You couldn't have jumped just once, and landed here."

"I jumped," said the Cook, quietly, "for a _very long _time."

"Oh, dear," said Alice. "I think I shall have to retire from this conversation while I still have my wits about me."

"Too late," said the Cook sharply, but the Hare patted the maligned girl on the head and advised,

"Don't listen to her, Alice. Cook thinks everything needs to be seasoned with pepper— even her conversation."

"Perhaps it's a good thing I quit speaking when I did, then," Alice whispered back.

"You should not have even started, really," said the Hare.

The Duchess, meanwhile, was snapping her fingers at the Hatter's daydreaming face. He sat up abruptly, and peevishly cried, "What? What is it that you want? I was in the midst of inventing parsley!"

"But surely parsley has already been invented," said Alice, immediately forgetting her resolve to withdraw from the conversation entirely.

"Not _orange_-flavored," said the Hatter, and turned to the impatient Duchess. "What is it you wanted?"

"Two high teas, to take with us," ordered the Duchess happily.

The Hatter stood up, very slowly, and with some drama straightened himself to his full, not considerable height. "Madam," he said, "I have told you before. I am not a tea shop. I am not a purveyor of tea, nor a seller of tea, nor a dealer of tea, nor a grower of tea. I do not guard tea, I do not hoard tea, I did not invent tea, and I will not bequeath my vast tea reserves to my inheritors should I die from surfeit of years. I cannot, in short, do you two teas, high or otherwise, to take with you. I am, in short, a Hatter."

"You_ are_, in _short_, a Hatter," retorted the Cook, looking down on him from her chair. The Hatter ignored her.

"I purvey, sell, deal in, make, guard, hoard, invent, and will bequeath hats."

"Fair enough," said the Duchess, looking down her nose at the little haberdasher. "We'll take two large toppers, then, please."

The Hatter, heaving a sigh, produced the top hats from under the table. One was bottle-green velvet, the other a quite handsome violet with scarlet spots.

"Now, turn them upside down," said the Duchess.

The Hatter complied.

"Now, fill them with tea," said the Duchess, triumphant again.

The Hatter stared at her a moment, then shook his head, chuckling a little, and did so. The Duchess accepted the brimming hats, and said graciously, "Send the bill to my cousin, the Queen."

"I don't know anyone named Bill," said the Hatter, equally graciously, "but I will mark this down in my book."

"I cannot read," retorted the Duchess, and turned up her nose at him. The Hatter stared at her.

"I wonder," he said slowly, "if one could learn to turn _down_— no, hold on, I've had that thought before—"

The Cook removed a tall wooden pepper mill, like a scepter, from an apron pocket.

"Guess what this needs," she said, dourly, and began to grind. Pepper flew everywhere with the force of her assault; the tea grew black and full of floaty bits. Both Cook and Duchess began to sneeze with such force that they flew backwards out of the garden, becoming Kooc and Ssehcud by default; propelled by the force of their sneezes they soon were out of sight, back the way they'd come.

"So much," sighed the Hare, wiping his streaming eyes with his ear, "for the turn of the earth." He turned his attention to the Hatter, who had given up chuckling in favor of guffaws; he was now almost violently amused by some private joke. "_What_ is so funny?"

"The laugh's on them!" said the Hatter, gasping. "I _never_ tea-proof my hats! They're going to _leak_!"

The Hare stared him down till he quieted, with a few final "Ahems."

"You are _so_ smug, aren't you?"

"Quite," said the Hatter, and he was.

"What does 'bequeath' mean?" asked Alice, who had been wondering this for several minutes now.

"It means who I leave things to, should I die," said the Hatter, with unexpected kindness and clarity.

"Am _I _in your will?" asked the Hare, perking up considerably.

"Nonsense," said the Hatter serenely, "_I'm_ going to live forever."

He reached for the pot, and refilled his cup.


	4. Clean Cup, Move Down

**Clean Cup, Move Down**

They were at tea.

They were always, always, at tea.

The Hatter slammed his palm down on the table in a businesslike manner, making the dishes rattle and jump. "I'm fed up!" he announced.

"Then stop eating," advised the Hare. The Hatter rewarded this piece of impertinence with a stolid, steel-tipped glare.

"We cannot go on this way," he continued, pursuing his original point. "I say we cannot!"

"Well, we could if we really wanted to," said the Hare.

The Hatter waved a hand. "Well, yes, yes, indeed," he acknowledged, and lapsed into thought for a moment. "But shortly we will run out of tea things— and what do we do then? Start supper? Start over?"

"I don't see why not." The Hare picked up his teacup and inspected it closely. "It's not as though they're worn through."

"They soon will be, however, if you keep rubbing them with sandpaper," put in Alice, glaring severely at the Dormouse. He looked up from his endeavors and blinked sleep-lidded eyes at her.

"The wafer is paper-thin," he piped, "and the paper is wafer-thin."

The Hatter snorted. "That's hardly hygienic, is it?"

"I'm trying," said the Dormouse, waving the porcelain saucer at him with one hand and the square of sandpaper with the other, "to remedy the situation."

Alice took the saucer from him and scrutinized it. "Already you've rubbed the paint off. And such a lovely pattern, too."

"Ho-hum," sighed the Dormouse, and began to sandpaper his nose, absentmindedly.

The Hatter stabbed a finger at him. "It's _exactly_ that sort of attitude that got us into this mess," he proclaimed. "I declare a state of emergency!"

The Hare yelped, covered his head with both arms and his arms with both ears, clambered under the table and curled into a quivering lump of terror.

"Why, whatever is the matter with him?" wondered Alice.

"He never was much good in an emergency," said the Hatter, and sniffed.

Alice considered the various options open to her and ventured, "Mr. Hatter— I believe I've had an idea."

"Well, that doesn't happen very often, does it?" said the Hatter. "You'd better hold on to it. Who knows when you'll get another one."

Alice was only going to say that perhaps they should set up a dishwashing station at the end of the table and all take turns, but the Hatter's response so flustered and discombobulated her that she lapsed into confused silence instead.

"Now, I'll tell you what we'll do," said the Hatter, with another decisive rap on the table. "We'll appeal to the Queen. We'll appeal for a repeal of our appalling predicament. We'll personally prise from the preposterous personage a pretty purple-prosed pardon, pondering our passage with pleas of please."

"_Please_ of _pleas_," said the Dormouse.

"That's what I said," said the Hatter.

"Pleas of peas," said the Dormouse, crossing his eyes to check on the progress of his nose erosion. "Peas of peace."

The Hatter smiled genially and nodded his head. "Quite. Quite."

"Pish posh," said Alice. The Hatter glared at her.

"_No_," he said.

There was a thump from below the table as the Hare bumped his head. Rubbing at his skull with one hand, he emerged from the shadows and regained his seat as though nothing had happened.

"Don't be ridiculous," he said. "You know the Queen will never listen to you. She's been out of sorts with you ever since the singing incident. _You_ remember."

"Twinkle twinkle, little bat?" suggested Alice. The three stared at her as though she'd declared her love for jabberwockies.

"Stop being so pre_pos_terous," said the Hatter sourly. "It doesn't at _all _suit your complexion."

"Well, _what_ singing incident? That's the only one _I've_ ever heard of. And it's difficult to believe they've let you sing more than _once_." Alice folded her arms.

"The singing incident," said the Hare, "where he sang 'Mabel Had a Little Lamb.'"

"I wish you'd leave her out of this," said the Hatter, plaintively. But the Hare could not be stopped. Raptly, he rose from his seat and burst forth with song.

"_Mabel had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb_

_Mabel had a little lamb, which frequently did bleat._

_One afternoon at five she said, five she said, five she said_

_One afternoon at five she said, 'My friends, it's time to eat_.'"

"I don't see what's so bad about that," said Alice.

"Just you wait," said the Hatter, both hands over his face.

"_For sandwiches they all sat down, all sat down, all sat down_

_For sandwiches they all sat down, and then one had a hunch._

_'What was that lamb's name?' they cried, name they cried, name they cried_

_'What was its name?' and she replied, 'In fact, its name was Lunch_.'"

"Oh!" said Alice, and thought for a moment. "Well, I can see how that would upset the Council for Ethical Treatment of Nursery Rhyme Animals—"

"CETNRA Centre," piped the Dormouse in his sleep, holding an imaginary mouthpiece up. "How may I direct your call?"

"—but I don't quite see why it would bother the Queen. Does her Majesty like sheep?"

"Like them?" The Hare snorted. "Medium rare, perhaps."

"Mayday!" shrieked the alarmed Dormouse into the imaginary mouthpiece. "_Mayday_!"

"Then why should she be so upset about the song?"

"Because she wasn't_ invited_!" bellowed the Hatter. "She found Mabel— my dear, sweet, impressionable Mabel— and turned her into a frog! A dear, sweet, and _very_ impressionable _frog_! Myself she re-imprisoned back in the same hour, here to wither away with only tea and crumpets to eat."

"You don't appear to have withered," commented Alice, eyeing the Hatter's robust physique.

"I hide it very well," snapped the Hatter, tugging on his waistcoat. "At any rate, we'll get out of here somehow. Supposing we hire a lawyer."

"A liar?" questioned the Hare.

"No, a lawyer."

"That's what I said," said the Hare, and sipped genteely from his cup.

The Hatter ignored him and pointed at Alice imperiously. "Take a letter to my lawyer!"

"You'll have to give it to me first," Alice objected, whereupon the Hatter stared at her and quivered in unspeakable emotion for a moment before giving up, sighing, and settling down to it himself. He scribbled away at one end of the table, and Alice turned aside to murmur to the Hare, "I can't think what good that will do."

"You can't think?" The Hare nodded. "That's _hardly_ a surprise, Alice."

Quite put out at this reaction, Alice crossed her arms and resolved to remain silent till she saw what should come next.


	5. Let Us Talk About The Weather

**A/N: Sorry it's been so long between updates! Since there's not a great deal of plot to this, and it's just a series of one-shots, I'm writing entirely as the mood takes me.**

* * *

**Let Us Talk About The Weather, That Subject Is Sure To Offend No One**

They were at tea.

The Dormouse had recovered from his seeming lunatic episode and was now calmly dipping his paw into his cup and fingerpainting on the no-longer-pristine white tablecloth. He drew a crooked little house, and outside of it a long table, at which sat a man in a hat, a tiny creature with big round ears, a rabbitish-looking thing, and a mishapen form that looked like a creature from a child's nightmare.

Alice was a _little_ insulted; but, she considered to herself (for no one else was listening) the monster in the picture might not be her after all.

The Dormouse dipped its paw back into the tea._ Alice_, it scrawled above the monster's head, and drew an arrow pointing downwards.

Still, Alice told herself, it might just be a case of the Dormouse's poor drawing skills. One must never be unkind to those who bear no natural talent, for it can't be their own fault.

Another dip for more tea. _Boy is she ugly_, the Dormouse wrote, leaning its chin on its other paw.

Alice shook herself and straightened up. No sense in paying _that_ any attention. She glanced up instead at the sky, seeking a neutral topic of conversation. "What a beautiful day," she said.

"That's what _you_ think," snapped the March Hare. "I declare it looks as though it will rain."

The Hatter's reaction to this would have been most curious from any man in his right mind. Being as the Hatter was decidedly in his left, it hardly deserved a comment. He leapt do his feet and shook his fist under his friend's nose. "It. _Never_. Rains," he said, savagely.

The Hare cowered a little behind his teacup.

"It _must_ rain here _some_times," said Alice, petulantly, feeling as though this were a conversation she could easily get in on. "Or else how would the flowers grow?"

"Who says they do?" retorted the Hatter, with a show more of pointlessness than actual conversation. He subsided back into his chair. Alice looked at him a moment, and went on.

"It's not nice to argue with someone for the sake of arguing with them. Daddy always says that's politics."

"Who says I am?" said the Hatter, leaning back in his chair and spreading his arms wide. Alice crossed hers, and frowned at him.

"You're not much of a conversationalist, I must say."

"Who asked you?" said the Hatter, covering a yawn with one hand. Alice decided there was truth in the saying that discretion is the better part of valor. Discretion, in this case, would almost certainly point to leaving while she still had her wits about her. Not that she can say this to the Hatter, of course; she could picture his retort with disturbing clarity. _Wits?_ he would cry. _Who said anything about wits?_

Or, even worse: _Too late._

"Well, if you're going to be like that--- you obviously aren't in the mood for company. Good day, Mr. Hatter." And she turned on her heel and prepared to leave the garden. But the Hatter had risen from his chair, he was reaching out a hand towards her, he was saying,

"Who says I'm not? Alice."

She turned back.

"Alice," he said, with what would almost be a kindly smile on any other face. "Don't go just yet, Alice. All I said was, it never rains---"

"But it _must_!"

"It never rains, but it pours," he went on, and waved her to a chair. "More tea, my dear?" The pot hovered over the waiting cup. He hung on her answer.

Alice took a deep breath, and a seat, and a firm hold on herself.

"Thank you, Mr. Hatter," she said. "I believe I will."


End file.
